Kirsten and Mark

In other words, Rocky Mountain National Park.

Lucky us, our first weekend here Mark’s brother Paul and his daughter Julia came to visit. They’d had a trip planned for a few months, and we happened to be here.

Paul has been to Colorado several times, and has wanted to take a special road up to the top of one of the mountains for a while, but it’s only open during a couple of months in the summer. It just so happens to be August.

After helping us move some of our furniture into place–Thanks Paul!–We headed toward Estes Park, gateway to RMNP. It’s a beautiful drive, and while on the way, Britton learned how to be a “guppy” from cousin Julia. It’s hilarious.

Mark got lots of the scenic pictures…maybe I’ll get him to post them some day, but driving higher and higher on the mountain on a one-way dirt road was quite fun. We did see a waterfall and creek…

Britton has a hard time looking at the camera. When we say “look at me” he looks up in the air way too high. Not sure where this comes from. He’s also saying cheese…

Finallly, we made it to the top. It’s known as an Alpine Tundra or something like that. Up at 11,000 feet, it’s winter most of the time. But it makes for gorgeous scenery!

Wow. So beautiful. Yes, that is snow still clinging to the hill.

And, I guess this will do for my 36 week belly shot too.

We had a great time at the park, driving over the continental divide and seeing so many lakes and streams. Paul was a great guide and we’re looking forward to going back. Now that we’re Coloradans I guess it’s a requirement.

Britton had a lot of fun with Julia. She was a great helper too.

Sprout Shell had a trade show scheduled the first week of August. It kind of fit in perfectly with the moving time line. We weren’t super excited about it though, since it did cause a lot more stress and coordination.

Back in May I scored a great deal on our hotel at the Golden Nugget. The north end of the strip doesn’t get as much attention, but this place was really nice and had a great pool–complete with shark tank in the middle and tube slide running through it.

Anyway, the trade show ended up not being what we had hoped or planned for. I did find some bedding for Kaia, scored some adorable Squeakers shoes for a great price, and we got a few orders, but that was about all.

Here’s our booth though…

So, we packed up and enjoyed the rest of our week doing this:

Chillin'

Reading

Drinking Coke

Trying on M&Ms hats

And SLEEPING!

Seriously. Our room got so dark with the curtains drawn it we wouldn’t know if it was 2:30 am or 2:30 pm.

Britton insisted on sleeping with me all week. He NEVER does that. He just rolls around and tosses and turns whenever we try it. He usually has to be in his own bed. Maybe he was traumatized from me being gone all day Monday, ’cause he was clingy all week too.

Our last night in town we went to a brand new restaurant–like, opening night–Max Brenner.

It’s a chocolate restaurant. Not everything has chocolate on it, or in it, but some things do. And especially their desserts! Oh my. We shared dinner so we’d have room for all the things we wanted to try.

One of the rare moments that Britton cooperated…until dessert came.

Our dessert spread

Dip your own ice cream, chocolate apple streusel with caramel sauce, Smores Sundae and Chocolate pizza with marshmallows. It was SOOOOOO good. We will definitely have to go back and try more of the chocolate deliciousness.

So, despite it not turning out like we planned, it was actually a very nice week. But, I was ready to get out of there and on the road to our new life.

This was the hardest part of leaving LA. We’ve had some great friends there. Most of them moved away ahead of us. Some have been there for us all along. And some were new. Sad.

Amanda and me amidst all of our chaos. Thanks for everything.

Michelle, fellow preggo, and distant relative of Mark’s–you’re great. So glad we got to be friends.

Our way too cool for words friends Adam and Erin–you guys rock! Thanks for the boxes too!

Aw, Paige and Mav. What will we do without you?!?!? Our lives will never be the same. Thank heavens for Skype.

And all of our other friends whom we didn’t get pictures with or get to say goodbye too…we love you and miss you and hope to see you soon!

Before we left we got together with a few of Mark’s former Napster co-workers (and friends, of course) for dinner at Chakra. It’s a great Indian in Beverly Hills for those of you in LA.

It was nice visiting and catching up since I don’t get to see them very often. Luckily the restaurant has a water wall that Britton found fascinating.

The Napsterites and friends…

Both Britton and Missy were unhappy at this point. I think for different reasons though. Missy–we’ll be sure to send you some Halloween pics, then you can photoshop yourself in.

The whole group. Thanks guys! It was great to see you.

So, when we flew to Denver to find a place to live we realized it was also our last little getaway before Kaia gets here. Britton was with his She-She (new name, we’re trying it out), and I missed him terribly, but we had a great time.

We went to see Inception–great movie. Though, I don’t know that it was entirely necessary to pay $17 for IMAX. Mark would disagree. We drove A LOT, had ice cream at Bonnie Braes, slept in, found a place to live (will take pics and get those up someday), visited the Temple grounds and generally enjoyed getting to know the area.

Since we’re super awesome, we didn’t take pictures except this:

and this:

The sunsets here are gorgeous!

On my way back to LA the clouds were awesome. I had to get some of them too.

It’s been forever since I’ve updated…and feel like I really should.

Yes, we have arrived in Denver, well Arvada, and we’re getting settled in. But, posts about leaving LA and all that will have to come a little later.

Here’s us at Disneyland with Gram

He likes to help shoot now. He does pretty well.

I found bunnies

Brit found the peeps in the cupboard and thought they were delicious!

Lay on my back?

He HATES to lay on his back in the pool. His teacher worked with him a lot on it.

Ready to launch

He does like to jump in though.

Drummer boys

Brit and his new friend Max drumming at the Grove.

But his favorite was the fountain

I tried to get him out the last few weeks and do things since I know he was bored if we stayed inside all day.

Yes, I mean Denver.

This will soon be our home. I know, kind of crazy. After 5 years for me, and 7 for Mark, we’re leaving Los Angeles and moving to the wide open spaces =) ha. Kidding. Kind of. It’s a little scary, and a little bit stressful (especially right now, hello!) And A LOT sad.

But from what we hear it’s a beautiful city, we’ll love it there and it has horrible winters. So, two out of three isn’t bad. We will be able to afford a house sometime in the near future, and there are parks/open spaces about every 5 blocks or so–at least that’s what it looks like on Google Maps and Google Earth, so there will be somewhere for the kids to play. I’ll most likely have a washer and dryer, and definitely a dishwasher too. These are all things I’m looking forward to.

Leaving will be hard too. I know this city, I have dear friends and family here–finally. Though, I expect to be back on a regular basis for Britton’s job commitments.

Mark is excited about his new job. Maybe he’ll post about it on his site. I’ll remind him. It will be positive for him, and his career, and that’s always a good thing. Especially these days.

We’ll be sure to keep you posted as things get closer. In the mean time, I’m going to get as much fun LA stuff done as I can in the next 2 weeks!

So, I’ve been asked to show some pregnancy pics…guess it shows how different this blog is the 2nd time around. With Britton there were the weekly updates, and our readers probably knew a lot more than they cared to about fetal development.

Sorry Kaia! We really do love you and are excited for you to come. There just seems to be other things going on now, and I’m not sitting bored behind a desk all day.

Luckily, we have been taking weekly photos to document our progress. ( Don’t let my gorgeousness overwhelm you…we take them in the morning, which usually means before “getting ready for the day”)

Week 5:

Week 15:

Week 27:

Now, we’ve got 12 weeks to go! Feeling pretty good. Some days I have more energy than others. My exercise is taking care of Britton, unless he insists on “playing a game, baby stats” which means ME doing the games on the Wii Fit Plus.

She’s growing well–according to how much weight I’m gaining and my size.

Thankfully it hasn’t been too hot yet here in LA. Sometimes I feel like I’m roasting!

Whenever it’s Mark’s special occasion and he gets to choose dinner or dessert, he likes to challenge my baking abilities.

Usually he chooses some cake or something that I’ve never made before and is kind of elaborate. Remember the White Chocolate Raspberry Cake and Flourless Chocolate Cake? Well, this Father’s Day was no different. We made Raspberry Lemon Tart. It comes from one of our “Bride and Groom Cookbook” (from Williams Sonoma of course) I like it because using it makes me feel sophisticated and grown up.

Anyway, here’s the final result:

Technically, it’s a pie, not a tart since I didn’t have the right pan, but it turned out delicious!

Side view

Both of my guys seemed pleased.

Britton loves his daddy, and often prefers him over me. Which I don’t mind so much, since I’m with him all day. Sometimes he actually cries when Mark goes to work, and loves to run up and give him hugs when he gets home. Sign of a great daddy for sure.

Happy Father’s Day sweetheart!

A couple of weeks ago when Mark was out of town Britton and I went down to Newport beach with my family. Even my great aunt and uncle came, so we had a nice group. What we didn’t have was sun.

It was beautiful and sunny as we were on our way; we figured the marine layer would burn off by noon. It didn’t.

This was our view until we left at 3:30 when the wind picked up and it got chilly.

We did have fun though. Britton loves his aunt Chezney.

And…

Swimming in the sand

Dumping sand on himself

Playing with Shells

Throwing dice

The girls…and boy.

Britton fell asleep as soon as we backed out of the parking space. Thanks for the fun day mom!